DOOM 3: Resurrection of Evil

Too much of the same, unfortunately.

You don't come to Mars expecting happy thoughts and romantic comedies. No, that's not why you're here. You buy a one-way ticket to sci-fi's favorite getaway because you have an itch to blast the head off some unholy abomination, whose skeletal frame and shoulder-mounted rockets remind you strangely of study halls and Trapper-Keepers.

But by now, conventional wisdom tells us that mocking the ridiculousness of Doom's premise and creature aesthetics is, in itself, a pointless endeavor. The game is swiss cheese by design, its mojo working you over like the most gorgeous B-movie ever made. And despite complaints from certain gamers that Doom 3 was an orgy of monster closets and simplistic A.I. -- a decadent showcase of flash over substance -- the game was undeniably compelling, pacing tension-filled exploration with cathartic violence. It was both the ultimate playground for both the bleeding-edge PC graphics-whore, and the FPS purist cruising for some guilty pleasures.

But all of this you already know. Duh. You're reading a review for Resurrection of Evil, a PC expansion pack -- you already know how awesome and stupid Doom 3 was, and how the game rocked 2004 in a way no one thought possible. But it's worth bringing up now because it's impossible to talk about why Resurrection of Evil is so disappointing without fully understanding what made Doom 3 such a tight rush. And if Doom 3 had a fortuitous right-place-right-time sort of arrival, filling our collective vacuum of anticipation for the long overdue Half-Life 2 months later, then Resurrection of Evil, its follow-up, feels like it's too little too late, rehashing the same horror gimmicks -- this time sans the element of surprise.

Not quite a full-blown chapter, Resurrection of Evil takes place 2 years after the destruction of UAC's Mars research facility. Wasting no time, and apparently incapable of heeding good advice, the company decides to reopen the Mars project by sending in a group of soon-to-be-unhappy marines to investigate a mysterious beacon. After a chain of predictable, satanic mishaps, you remain, once again, the sole combatant against a tide of biblical evil -- albeit, this time, you're in the body armor of a different but just as generic Caucasoid space marine with a crew cut.

It's amazing that even with pretty much an entirely new cast of throwaway, high-poly-count digital actors, their roles and the story at large remains mostly the same. There's the initial chaos, then a string of errands issued by a calm voice of authority over the radio -- you'll find voice recordings and and tongue-in-cheek training videos, as well as inconsequential NPCs whom you'll be tempted to shoot, but can't.

To compensate for the lack of narrative invention, Resurrection of Evil opts to focus less on the deliberately paced creeping horror of its predecessor, and maximize on run-and-gun action. As such, the game is harder and more relentless than ever. To help you cope with the demonic gangbang that awaits, you're dealt most of the mainstay weapons within the first few areas of the game. A few handy extras make their debut in this add-on: a double-barrel shotgun (only holds two buckshots, but with this much firepower, two is all you need); a physics gun that lets you throw objects and fling enemy projectiles back in their faces; and a nasty-looking artifact that throws your screen into a blurry disarray while slowing down time and all those around you.

Besides a handful of new (yet still retarded looking) creatures from hell, that's pretty much the extent of what's new on Mars. Whereas the original Doom 3 featured dense, serpentine level designs that played every bit as much of a starring role in exerting dread and ambience, the environments here lack a sense of coherency, even while it tries to hit you over the head with its own exoticism. Again, the problem here is simple: There really isn't a single reason to play Resurrection of Evil over the original Doom 3, except maybe because you crave more of the same -- and yet -- if "sameness" is what you're after, why not just replay the original, more superior, game over and over again?